


but you seem okay with being strong

by theseerasures



Category: Jessica Jones (TV)
Genre: F/F, F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-03-28
Updated: 2016-03-28
Packaged: 2018-05-29 15:11:21
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,105
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6381400
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/theseerasures/pseuds/theseerasures
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>My best friend is<br/><em>serenely confident</em><br/>a little bit of this and a little bit of that.</p>
<p>Five times Jess and Trish share a bed.</p>
            </blockquote>





	but you seem okay with being strong

**Author's Note:**

  * For [ProfessorSpork](https://archiveofourown.org/users/ProfessorSpork/gifts).



> A now rather egregiously late birthday present for Leah.

1.

Philip’s head is soft.

Jessie remembers, in the fuzzy way where she’s not sure if it’s really remembering, the way his head had felt as a baby—all crumby lumps and dented spots—it feels like that now, all over. Her fingers sink very slightly into his skull, something _crunches_ , and then the smell surrounds her, rusty metal filling her nose, her mouth—

And then something shoves at her, pulls her hair. Someone. She jerks awake to a voice: “Shut up. Shut _up_ , stupid. You’ll wake my mother.”

Jess opens her mouth—to tell Patsy to go fuck herself, maybe—but the only thing that comes out is a dry click in her throat, and then she hears an angry huff. “Move over.”

“Wha—“ she tries to ask, but there’s a tight fist on her heart and it jerks her, doesn’t let her finish.

“Move _over_.” She shoves Jess again and Jess moves, more out of shock than anything else.

In the morning Jess wakes up with a mouthful of hair and Trish’s icy sharp toenails digging into her calf, but she feels more rested than she has in months.

2.

It’s a massive fucking mess, really.

Jess is halfway through a bottle of Dorothy’s finest Johnnie Walker and Trish’s pupils are the size of moons. There’s a ten-day suspension from school because she’d somehow ended up on the roof, there’s some kind of crappy _It’s Patsy_ publicity thing that Trish won’t talk about, and you know, whatever. It’s been three years and they’ve already run through this circus so many times Jess is starting to lose count; her whole family’s still dead, Dorothy’s still a bitch, they’re coping. They’re still coping.

Her eyes flicker to Trish, who looks up from where she’s mashing up her third Percocet like an old pro. “What?”

Jess shrugs, but that just makes Trish abandon her spot altogether. “What?” she asks again, scooting closer and aiming a hard poke at Jess’s ribs.

She bats Trish’s hand away. “Just thinking about how we should probably be in straightjackets.”

Trish squints at her and Jess rolls her eyes, because any minute now Trish is going to say something important, or condescending, or important and condescending, and she’s just not drunk enough to handle it yet.

So she closes the leftover space between them and kisses Trish.

It’s fast and almost simplistic but then Trish sighs a little and kisses back—then it just feels _simple_ , like this is a habit they’ve both had for ages. She shifts even closer and hears something like glass hitting hardwood floor, thinks _I really hope the whiskey hasn’t spilled, Dorothy’s gonna flip her shit—_

Then Trish tugs her shirt over her head and tosses it on the couch they’re leaning against, and _well._ _Well._

That’s as far as Jess’s brain will let her get. Her back arches as Trish’s tongue circles her left nipple and-- _Jesus_ , she remembers that one night with Erica Finley junior year but this feels nothing like it, not a damn thing.

Percocet must be like fucking _Adderall_ , because once she gets started Trish’s focus is way intense; she brings Jess to orgasm twice and is going for three when Jess finally manages to pull her head out of the alcohol and the _Jesus fucking Christ, Trish_ and notices that Trish is still wearing just about every article of clothing.

_Okay_ then. She reaches out blindly and finds the front of Trish’s jeans; there’s a belt that has some kind of fancy clasp that Jess half-heartedly fumbles with for all of three seconds before deciding _fuck it_ and just rips the whole thing in half—

Trish looks up, frowning, and Jess has to stifle a groan at the sudden loss of contact. “That was expensive, she’s—“

Jess swallows what comes next with another kiss, harder this time, before letting her hand drift down Trish’s now bare thigh. “Do me a favor and let’s _not_ bring up your mother right now.”

“What are you—“ Trish breaks off with a gasp and Jess smirks, resting her knuckles briefly against the warm fabric of Trish’s panties before ripping that off as well and slipping her fingers past.

Trish lets out a noise that’s half-whine, half-snarl. “Jess,” she says, “That’s not— _Jess_ , will you—“

“Shh,” Jess murmurs, pressing kisses against the hollow of Trish’s throat, against the narrow span of Trish’s ribs, against the ridge of Trish’s hip bone. She crooks a finger _just_ shy of Trish’s center. “Good things come to those who wait, ya know?”

“ _Fuck_ ,” is Trish’s eloquent response as she grinds against Jess’s hand. “ _Fuck_ —can you just— _left_ —“

“Here’s an idea,” Jess growls into Trish’s thigh, “If you’d just _stop_ with all the backseat driving—“

Her mouth finally meets up with where her hand is and Trish nearly bucks off the couch, letting out a strangled scream before pulling Jess up by the shoulders and flipping them over again.

They make it to a bed eventually.

Morning comes with the familiar headache and the even more familiar sound of retching. Jess makes her way over to the closest bathroom just in time to see Trish arc back over the commode, and obligingly sits down to hold back Trish’s hair. Trish is only wearing her socks, for some reason; Jess wonders if she’d just forgotten to take them off the night before.

Trish slumps back into Jess after she finishes throwing up, breathing roughly. “We’re going to be in so much trouble,” she mumbles.

Jess’s hand cramps halfway through tracing a circle on Trish’s back. “Yeah?”

There’s no response from Trish except a soft snore.

“Yeah,” Jess agrees, and lets herself press a quick kiss on Trish’s forehead before she puts them both back into bed.

3.

She crashes into Trish’s room after a dead end day of job searching and gets halfway through her greeting ("Today has been—“) before she sees Trish sitting on her bed, staring blankly out the window. “Geez. What’s _your_ damage?”

"What?” Trish asks, still looking out the window.

“You, damage,” Jess says lightly. In her mind, she’s shuffling through what might have gone wrong. It hasn’t been a bad year, with Dorothy at least legally off their backs. They’d even finally moved out of the old mansion and into something a little quainter (Trish’s word, _obviously_ ). Both of them are more often unemployed than not and mostly live off of the leftover money from Trish’s trust fund. It’s not exactly how Jess expected her twenties to turn out, but still: not bad. The only things she can think of are the issues that have followed them ever since they’ve met: mom, fame, drugs. “Fall off any wagons lately?”

That at least gets Trish’s attention. “Of course not.”

Jess nods, joining Trish in her vigil. Across the street, two women are sliding into a taxi; they could be going anywhere. “So…”

“So nothing,” Trish says. Suddenly she smiles, wide and blinding; it almost reaches her eyes. “You remember that fantasy show I was talking about? I auditioned for it today.”

“The one with the…dragons? Midget dragons?” Trish nods. “Right. And…you don’t think it went well?”

Trish holds her smile. “It went well,” she says, before she grabs the front of Jess’s jacket and pulls her in for a hard kiss.

Jess kisses back easily. It’s not like she doesn’t get stress, and if this is what Trish wants right now then Jess isn’t going to complain. They’ll have plenty of time to talk later.

She’s tugging Trish’s shirt off when she spots it: a blooming, purple bruise in the shape of a hand on Trish’s upper arm.

The world careens out of balance. “What the _fuck_?”

Trish pulls away instantly, her hair falling forward and hiding her face. “Jess, just—leave it.“

“Is your Mom back in town?” Jess demands. “Because if she is, we can—“ Trish shakes her head. “Then who? Trish—“

“It’s no one,” Trish says, re-buttoning her shirt. She still doesn’t look at Jess. “I told you, it’s not a big deal.”

“Not a big—Trish, now’s not the time to get all Stepford on me, okay? You need to tell me. If you’re—if somebody’s hurting you again—”

“How do you know it wasn’t you?”

It’s impossible, Jess knows, to actually feel your heart stopping. “What?”

Now Trish meets her eyes. Her gaze is glassy, but even. “You heard me.”

Jess lets out a slow breath. “Right,” she says, getting up. Her voice doesn’t shake. “Right.”

She just makes it out of the room before her knees buckle and she sinks down onto the floor. Inhale, exhale. Twenty seconds of rage rushing in her ears, shame closing her throat—

She bangs the door back open again. “No. You know what?”

Trish opens her mouth, but Jess beats her to it. “I _know_ I didn’t hurt you. I know. I know because we haven’t had sex in six days, and that bruise looks fresh, I know because that hand—the hand that fucking bruised you? It’s a hell of a lot bigger than mine.”

Inhale, exhale. “I know,” she says finally, “Because we’ve known each other for eight years now, Trish. And we’ve been screwing around almost as long. And I wouldn’t be careless like that. I wouldn’t _hurt you_ like that. I thought you knew.”

She drops back down on the bed, next to Trish. “I get that—you hurt. I know you even miss your mom sometimes. I get it, Trish, but you can’t…pulling this kind of crap, that’s not you. And if you’d just talk to me—“

“I went to audition this morning,” Trish interrupts, looking out the window again. “And the casting director stopped me halfway through, told me he’d seen enough. He said…he said that I wasn’t bad, but the minute I showed up onscreen anywhere all anyone would see is Patsy. Then he told me that this part could—could change that, maybe if I _matured_ a little more and…he grabbed me.”

Jess’s heart hammers, fast and cold. She reaches out, tangles their fingers together, but Trish’s hand is slack in hers. “Trish, he didn’t—“

“He let me leave. But then I thought, you know—what was I expecting? It’s a tough business. I walked out today, but other people won’t, and they’ll be working.”

There’s something in Trish’s face that’s desperate and hard; like she’s just waiting for the moment she turns into her mother. “I didn’t go to college. I barely went to school. I have no marketable skills. The only thing I’m good at is pretending to be someone else, and even that—no one takes a former child star seriously. And—what else am I supposed to do, Jess?”

“Whatever you want,” Jess replies. It sounds trite and useless, even to her own ears. “That was the whole _point_ , Trish.”

Trish barks out a short laugh. “I know. But I—“ She breaks off, shaking her head.

Jess squeezes Trish’s hand, pours in it as much of her strength as she thinks Trish can bear.

When Trish meets her eyes, there are tears on her lashes. “I’m sorry I lied to you.”

Jess huffs. “Yeah, well—it didn’t work, asshole.”

Trish shakes her head again. “I’m sorry,” she repeats.

Jess feels Trish’s long strong fingers tightening in her grip, not willing to let go, and figures hey, now’s a good time for a hug as any. “We’ll figure something out, okay?” She murmurs into Trish’s hair. “Whatever happens, I—I stick around. We’ll figure it out.”

They order takeout and bicker over which crappy Colin Firth movie to watch; halfway through _Nanny McPhee_ Jess’s arm falls asleep from the weight of Trish’s head on her shoulder.

She suffers through it, somehow.

4.

There people are swarming around her, buzzing like bees. She tries to swat them from her face, hears the meaty _thud_ of fist on flesh and a sharp yelp but it all disintegrates into a mess of soapy fuzz in her head; did she hit anyone? Her eyes drift shut and she lets the inky dark swirl around, soaks in the black. The air is cool and she could be _in_ it right now, flying, all smashed up dreams and busted brain and _leave her, Jessica_ and _come back here Jessica_

The world turns vertical again and she wobbles, dizzy sickness swooping over her. Next to her, someone grunts: “Jesus, Jess. Get it together.”

And there’s Trish, half-dragging her back to the penthouse, trying to support Jess’s frame. Not doing as well as she’d like, probably; Jess is bigger. She’s always been bigger.

Her jacket reeks of vomit and she tilts her head back further, trying to breathe in, slurs: “Was fine.”

Trish scoffs as she eases them both down onto her giant bed. “Yeah, you started a bar fight and then passed out on the floor before anyone else threw a punch. You were doing great.”

Something about Trish’s tone sends a spike of cold anger into her gut. “‘Cause you haven’t done worse while you were strung out.”

She can see Trish force herself not to react as she leans over to take off Jess’s boots. “I booked another therapy session for you tomorrow. You need help, Jess.”

“Some help,” Jess mutters. “Having me memorize old street names like he’s some high price SAT tutor—“

“It’d help if you actually went consistently instead of whenever you feel like it,” Trish interrupts. “And I told you, you don’t need to worry about the money.”

Jess rolls her eyes. “Right, of course. Saint Trish Walker, patron of the downtrodden and the head cases and the babies with lopsided heads. Her superpowers are throwing money at problems and knowing better than anyone else on this planet and have been passed down from mother to daughter—“

Trish pulls back, stung. “That’s not fair. I’m trying to help you, if you would just _listen_ to me for five seconds—“

_If you don’t listen to me, what’s the point of having ears?_

Something goes _snap_ her mind, the world hazing away in sickly yellow light and a blur of purple. “ _Stop telling me what to do!”_ she shouts, or maybe whispers, not like it made any difference with him—

Then there’s Trish pressed against the wall, eyes wide but calm; then there’s Jess’s fist, digging into Trish’s sternum.

“I’m not,” Trish says, still unshakeable.

It makes Jess flinch back, hands burning like they’ve been scalded, nausea rising _I almost I could have I_ did

A wet, ragged sound tears out of her throat and she closes her eyes. _Birch Street. Higgins Drive. Higgins Drive—_

“Jess. Jess, _look at me_. I’m okay.”

She pushes at Trish’s hand blindly. “Don’t. Don’t—go. Go, Trish.” _Higgins Drive._

“I’m not going anywhere,” Trish promises, and it makes Jess want to laugh. “Jess, it’s—“

Her eyes snap open of their own accord, and she looks—at the room, at the door, anywhere but at Trish. “ _Don’t_ say it’s fine.”

“I wasn’t,” Trish says, “I wasn’t. Will you—can you look at me?”

She turns away instead, back towards the bed. “Trish,” she says again, willing herself to say the name like a dismissal and not like a life buoy; not to use Trish’s name as a cane, to steady herself in the long haul out of the dark. “Will you just—fuck off, please.”

Not good enough, and maybe this is her weakness: that in spite of everything she’d done and everything that had left her a useless mess, she still can’t cut herself off from the people she’d hurt, her mind wobbling between stay-or-go.

“I don’t do that,” Trish says, and maybe that’s on Jess too, that she could say “fuck off” and all Trish would hear is “please stay.”

She gets into bed too, and reaches out to stroke Jess’s hair.

Jess recoils; it’s an almost-habit. “Don’t—just _don’t_ , okay? I just can’t handle being around you anymore.”

Now Trish’s eyes waver, turning a deeper green from surprise, from hurt. “Jess,” she whispers, but Jess turns on her side, pretends she doesn’t hear.

They stay on opposite sides of the bed all night, far apart enough for Kilgrave to lie between them. Eventually Trish’s breathing deepens into sleep, but Jess wills herself awake, tracing the blood vessels inside her eyelids.

5.

_“Alias Investigations, how can we help?”_

She deserves _some_ credit. The phone rings itself off its metaphorical hook, and Jess lets it, lets Malcolm answer dumbass call after dumbass call for a whole fifteen minutes before tossing him down the hall to his place, phone still in hand.

A whole fifteen: practically the path to sainthood, right there.

She heads to her room and Luke is everywhere. She musses up the sheets and remembers raspy breaths and the warm weight of him against her, before she made everything complicated; she trips over the chair and remembers the _cold_ weight of him against her, dragging his unconscious body across the threshold. Even the air carries a scent of him, now: wood and smoke and something tart. Triple Sec, maybe.

Miraculously, there’s still an unsmashed half handle of Knob Creek tucked in the bedside cabinet. Halfway through unscrewing the cap she decides that maybe an unmedicated nap is the way to go, here, and just sprawls out on the bed.

She thinks about time.

When he wasn’t having her recite street names, her therapist had a habit of doling out words of wisdom that sound like things you’d find in stoned fortune cookies. _The hardest thing about pain is sticking around_ —that was one. _Trauma has an itinerary of its own_ —that was another, and she thinks about it now, tries to package everything she’s done or hasn’t done into hours, days.

Fifteen minutes, and then she kicked Malcolm out; she’d spent most of the early morning with Hogarth, which means Kilgrave has been dead— _really_ dead—for about half a day. Which means it’s been about a day since she and Claire dragged Luke back to her place, which means it’s been about two days since she met up with Luke again. Which means it’s been about three days since Simpson trashed her apartment. Which means it’s been about four days since Hope—

Jess snaps the thought shut, but the horror gushes forward: the immaculate looking glass stem, spurts of blood…she squeezes her eyes closed, inhales. _Birch Street._

There’s a quiet knock. Jess doesn’t answer, just keeps her breathing focused and marvels a little at how the trick still works even after what Kilgrave did to her old house, to her old memories. _Higgins Drive, Cobalt Lane_. Three seconds, then exhale.

She opens her eyes, and Trish is leaning against the doorframe, her face apologetic. “I didn’t mean to interrupt.”

“You didn’t,” Jess assures her. She doesn’t move to get up; it’s been a long day, even if it’s not noon yet.

Trish takes that as an invitation to come in, nudging Jess to scoot over. They lie there together, silent; it could have been a year ago. They could still be kids.

After a while, Trish clears her throat. “Is...Luke?”

Jess shrugs. “Gone. And I’m choosing to take that as a good sign. Least he woke up enough to get the hell out of Dodge, right?”

Trish reaches over and takes Jess’s hand. “He’ll come back.”

"I killed his wife," she says, shaking her head. "People don’t just get over that in a couple of days unless they've been Kilgraved. I should've known, but I...”

She’s never been afraid of sex; even Kilgrave hadn’t changed that. It’s been “have fun, get out, _wham bam thank you ma’am”_ with nearly everyone, but Luke had set all her super-senses on high and pooled them in the deep place where she laughs and cries. She _had_ been scared. She’d been scared of him, and it hadn’t been until she was lying next to his comatose body babbling about bowling that she’d realized, _oh_. The fear had come from making plans.

She pushes down the part of her that says that the fear had been _right_. “It’s like—you’ve been my good-touch gauge for years, y’know."

“Aw, I love you too,” Trish says, grinning.

“Shut up. And then he—I see him and all I want to do is—I don’t know. Cook for him, or something.”

Trish just fiddles with Jess’s fingers, doesn’t reply.

“You’re not gonna make a crack about how I can’t cook?” Jess asks after a while, “I left it wide open.”

“Too easy,” Trish snorts. Her face grows serious again. “You’re allowed to miss him.”

“Yeah.” Jess thinks about those six months, about seeing Trish’s face all over the city. About the way Trish had sounded in her voicemail: _Jess, can you please just tell me if you’re alive?_ She’d listened to the first couple messages before archiving the rest along with her memories. “I missed you,” she tells Trish, like she’s the kind of person who says this kind of crap all the time now, this uncorked bottle of _I love yous_.

“And I missed you. But you and Luke...it doesn’t have to get as bad as we were before it gets better. _We_ shouldn’t have gotten to that point. I shouldn’t have let it.”

Jess rolls her eyes. “Right, I forgot it’s all your fault.”

Trish just keeps on playing with Jess’s fingers. “I called my sponsor this morning,” she finally says.

It’s a pretty abrupt change in subject, but Jess rolls with it. “Simpson’s pills?”

“It wasn’t a slip,” Trish replies immediately. “I’m not planning on a relapse, but who plans for one, right? And with everything that’s happened recently…I just want to be sure.”

“Everything that’s happened recently,” Jess repeats, “Kilgrave or your mother?”

Trish's eyes flicker in surprise. “Both. How did you—“

“You had a look. In the car, when you were telling me about where I might’ve gotten my powers—and earlier, when you met Luke. You just had a look.”

“Yeah," Trish says, exhaling harshly. "She came by, when I was in the hospital.”

“And?”

“And then again, after I got discharged. It was—“ Trish breathes in, shaky, and focuses on Jess’s hand. “Well, you know. The usual. Tried to lure me back with more information about IGH, put on a big show about regrets, told me to come _home_ , like she was ever--like the only thing keeping us from being one big happy family is that I’m more interested in being right than giving her another chance. And...I want to be sure, so. I called my sponsor. We’re going to a meeting tomorrow.”

Jess rubs Trish’s knuckles gently with her thumb. “Good.”

“You could come,” Trish ventures, hesitant.

“I could,” Jess echoes. “But…I don’t know.”

She waits for Trish to push. Trish _has_ pushed, in the past, but now all she does is offer Jess a small smile.

Grief lashes into her chest, but she’s ready for it this time, lets it bubble up instead of pushing it down. “I killed his wife.”

Trish keeps quiet, listens.

“He got hurt. _You_ got hurt. And Hope—“ In her mind a girl flounders in an ocean of blood; drowning, drowning, gone.

“My family died,” she says finally, “A long time ago, I mean. The car crash—maybe I’m a magnet. Everyone close who’s ever gotten hurt—I brought that to them.”

“Are we back to this again?” Trish asks. When Jess doesn’t reply, she sighs. “It’s not true, Jess. Everyone has some pain in their life. You didn’t give it to them, and you shouldn’t feel responsible for it. All you can do is…show them a way to overcome, the best you can.”

“I know. But…” _You’re not a piece of shit_ , Luke had told her, before the complicated mess she’d been trying to hold up crashed around their ears. For a moment she just lets herself feel everything: the roughness of her sheets, the press of her pillow. Feels the intense, grinding sensation of just _sticking around_. She has no power to ward against this kind of pain except Trish’s hand in hers.

“I still hurt,” She admits, a long while after.

Trish’s smile is clear and true. “Well. That’s why you’re a hero.”

“Yeah. You too,” she tells Trish, who hums quietly in acknowledgement.

There are still things to do, words to say, people to help; but for now she’s content to just lie there, Trish by her side.

She thinks she’s earned that much.

**Author's Note:**

> ...I feel like I should point out that Percocet is literally, categorically, NOTHING like Adderall. Please do not take any stray observations about drugs made by a drunk and horny Jessica Jones at face value.


End file.
